


At Night Inside My Mouth (Oh, You're All I Taste)

by resident_longwinded_anon



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Established Relationship, Future Fic, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, hell talk, married, wedding vows
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-01
Updated: 2015-05-01
Packaged: 2018-03-26 13:39:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3852823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/resident_longwinded_anon/pseuds/resident_longwinded_anon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On Dean’s fortieth birthday, he pours himself a glass of wine and takes it into the backyard to watch the stars. </p>
<p>~</p>
<p>A moment in a life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	At Night Inside My Mouth (Oh, You're All I Taste)

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted over on [my Tumblr](http://resident-longwinded-anon.tumblr.com/post/117809642066/at-night-inside-my-mouth-oh-youre-all-i-taste), though not a prompt fill because my muse is fickle.
> 
> Title from In My Veins by Andrew Belle. ([x](http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCEQyCkwAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DrjP2XKD0Gb0&ei=8s9CVYzoJMSjNtfTgNAD&usg=AFQjCNEtHQZk4zW8_8ras6xFV2Lp1npBFQ&sig2=_dwYdBLqUxtinakqu1Ml8g&bvm=bv.92189499,d.eXY))
> 
> The specifics of the Hell talk are as follows: forced self-cannibalization and crucifixion. This takes place post-series and can be read as taking place post-s8. There is no Cas/ or Dean/Other in this fic.

On Dean’s fortieth birthday, he pours himself a glass of wine and takes it into the backyard to watch the stars. He settles on Cas’s favorite lawn chair and adjusts his glasses on the end of his nose. He really ought to invest in a telescope this year.

“What’s the occasion?” Cas asks behind him. Dean glances back - his husband is silhouetted by the porch light. If he squints, he can convince himself that Cas’s softly fluttering bathrobe is actually a pair of wings.

“What do you mean?”

“You never drink wine.” Cas grabs a deck chair and drags it out to sit next to Dean, who does his best to keep his gaze on the stars and not the age lines next to Cas’s eyes.

“Says who?”

“You, every time I pour myself a glass.”

“Now when have I said that?”

“‘You know what wine is, Cas? It’s grape juice for old people. Boring people who have decided they’re too old to enjoy good alcohol.’ 'Nobody actually likes wine, they just kid themselves into pretending they do. Have a scotch or something else that’s actually classy.’” He pauses for a moment. “I could go on.”

Dean sighs, rolls the glass in his hands. If he tilts it at the right angle, the wine reflects the stars. “It looks like blood.”

“We do own white wine, Dean.”

“That’s not what I mean.” He stares at the wine for a long moment, bracing himself to take a sip, but Cas lays a hand on his arm before the cup reaches his mouth.

“What do you mean?”

Dean brings the glass back to his lap, cradles it there. “I mean - ” He sighs, jiggles his knee so the tiny bloody sky in his cup shatters into garnets. “Do you know what today is?”

“I assume that’s a rhetorical question.”

“Forty years, Cas. Forty years. That’s what today is.”

Cas stays quiet.

“I finally broke the barrier. I’ve been on Earth for longer than I was in Hell.”

“Is that a good thing?”

“I’m not sure.” Dean sighs, takes a long drag of his wine. He wrinkles his nose. “It still tastes like blood.”

Cas grasps Dean’s free hand.

“That was one of their favorite things to do. They’d give me bread that turned to flesh in my mouth, wine made of my own blood. And god, I was so thirsty, I drank anything. I’d probably have eaten Sam if he stood still long enough.”

Cas rubs his thumb in soothing circles on Dean’s palm. “You remember when you met Jimmy, how Zachariah stole me away in order to, ah, 'recondition’ me?”

“Of course.”

“Well, Heaven loves crucifixion. He crucified me thirteen times before I finally caved. He did it in all sorts of interesting ways, too. Upside down, sideways, nails through my stomach and thighs. Once he rigged the cross to spin, and whenever the blood rushed to my head and I thought I might finally faint he sent it whirling around to revive me.”

“I don’t need” - Dean’s voice breaks. “Why are you telling me this?”

“Lots of reasons. To remind you that you don’t have to suffer alone. To help you remember that the beings who did those awful things to us are gone for good. To take your mind off the horrors you’ve suffered. We don’t need to retread these things, love. We’ve done that enough.”

“But” - his voice catches in his throat - “tell me what I am now, now that the majority of me is life instead of death. I don’t - I can’t remember what it’s like to be more human than demon.”

“Oh, Dean.” Cas clambers out of his chair and kneels at Dean’s feet. “Look at me.”

“I’m looking at you.”

“Hell didn’t make you lesser, love. If anything, it made you more. All you are, all the love and power packed so tightly inside of you - it only packed it in tighter. You’ve always only been more human than demon, despite everything around you. There’s nothing new or different about you now. It’s just another anniversary.”

“Wish I could believe that.”

Cas sits back on his ankles and looks up at Dean, adoring. His eyes, too, reflect the sky, dark and ageless and sparkling. “You don’t need to. Let me do it.”

“'Cause it’s not like you’ve already - ”

“Dean.” Cas reaches up, grasps both of Dean’s hands in his. The wine tips onto the grass, forgotten. “I will hold out faith while you cannot.”

“I can’t ask you to do that, Cas.”

“You don’t need to. It’s my job, remember? 'With this ring, I give you all of me, all my heart, and all my mind, all my soul, and all my strength.’”

“'I will have you and hold you,’” Dean continues, “'for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health - ’”

Cas finishes with him. “'To love and to cherish for the rest of my life.’”

Dean collapses forward, desperate all of a sudden for Cas’s warmth. Cas rises to meet him; their foreheads clunk together with a sound like home.

“I love you so much,” Dean whispers. “God, what would I do without you?”

Cas works his arms around Dean’s back so he’s supporting most of his weight. He rubs a hand up and down, taking special care to knead the sore spot by Dean’s left shoulder. “Oh, love. You don’t need to find out.”


End file.
